Here are the edited sprites + aurumoth for comparison:
I'll make my final submission tomorrow.
So final comments are welcome.

Comments: Goldenbanana: wow! If this is your first time spriting, I think it's incredible! The colors look really nice, and the pose is adorable. But I actually like the unedited sprite more. It give a more frontal view. I would position the head a bit more upwards and reduce the size of the colar. Hopefully there will also come a sprite of argalis :)

Little Cup Co-Leader

noobiess, I'm sorry if you're already aware of this but I'm pretty sure they have to be on a transparent background. Other than that they're great. Just checking you knew that 'cos I don't want them to be invalid.

Final thoughts:
I didn't use the standing pose for Cupra because it felt unnatural to me that is would stand up for the whole time. But I hope that in the animation it will stand up because it's an awefully cute pose.
For Argalis I chose a neutral, somewhat static, pose to give it that coccoonish effect.
Also I am pro against putting the sprites together in the polls. I think the styles of the sprites of the participants are too diffrent to match well.

Moderator

Argh noobiess, I probably should've posted earlier but I think there might be some problems with the arm placement on your Argalis back sprites! The right arm/shell appears to be much further forward than it appears on the regular sprite, since your back sprite seems to be suggesting that that arm is blocking off at least 3/4 (or more) of the left body shell as opposed to the <1/2 it shows on the front sprite. Might be a minor issue but it's one that stood out to me, personally.

Here are my front and back sprites. Only difference between the two front sprites is a slightly changed position of the eyes, as per Lster728s advice. This is my first rendition of the back sprite, but I tried to make it as close to finished as possible.

Moderator

Hey everyone, I've been very busy with studying for a pair of exams I have tomorrow, and am not going to have to time to get a poll up until tomorrow, so I'm just going to leave this open until then. Most of you have already finished your sprites, but if you have any last minute changes to make, you have a little bit more time to do so.

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elcheeso: Initial suspicions and art style aside, you have a fair set of sprites, and I enjoy the congruency in shiny designs. With that not aside, I think the sprites could have less cel-shading and more geometry. One particular thing I notice is Argalis's front sprite's 'beak', or so it appears. The right side of the beak's line could have less of an angle to lessen the shape's linearity.

GoldenBanana: Aaaaaaah, I love your front Argalis sprite. :D It just works somehow, to a better extent than mine. The back one is almost as good, except that the left floating shell is a bit too curved compared to the front ones. That aside, the sprites have spectacular shape to them. Wonderful!

Frost-Phoenix1: I like the way you've made Argalis's fur, and the shells' shading is nice. The one thing that looks off is the extended shell on the back sprite, since it looks too bent for it to be just slightly curved like the other shells. Could the outlines on the bottom sections be less parallel, and if so, would that help its shape?

noobiess: Would you mind if the shiny sprites are just a tad closer in color to Aurumoth's? Make the purple tints blue instead? :) I hope you take that comment out of the others I've made, since I'd vote for your sprites with your sort of congruency in effect.

Moderator

Ok. Time to close this up. I didn't really get many responses as to how to do the polls, but since we have one person who only submitted for one, the only real fair way to do it is with separate polls.